Officers with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) arrested two Clay County teenagers Friday morning on charges of torturing a gopher tortoise.
Danielle Susan Dionne, 15, and Jennifer Emoke Greene, 18, have been arrested on charges of felony cruelty to animals, a third-degree felony, and taking, harassing, harming or killing a gopher tortoise, a second-degree misdemeanor.

Cedar Key and Levy County will get a high profile boost with tourists along Interstate 75 in Gainesville during what is typically a slow season.
Carol McQueen has been in negotiations to design billboards that tout the county’s attractions to people traveling through Gainesville.

At about 7 p.m., Friday, July 18, the Levy County 9-1-1 Communications Center received a call reporting an overturned boat with three passengers. Cedar Key Fire and Department of Public Safety Battalion-1 and Medic 5 (Cedar Key) responded to the scene. En route to that call, another call came in for an overturned kayak with two passengers in the water.

TALLAHASSEE — The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles is reminding everyone to take additional steps to ensure that no child is left unattended in a vehicle this summer. This year, there have been two reported cases in Florida of children dying of heatstroke after being left in cars. Don’t be distracted when leaving your vehicle and take a second look in the back seat to ensure a child is not left behind.

Property values are up a smidgen this year, so the Levy County Commission will be giving property owners a break, tentatively dropping the millage from last year’s 8.3307 to 8.2741 mills.

The unanimous action by the commissioners came at the end of a budget workshop on Tuesday, said County Coordinator Fred Moody. Property taxes are just one part of the budget picture with grants, fees, penalties and interest on due bills and assessments also being collected. The preliminary county budget is estimated to have $61,953,536 in revenue in the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1.

While Cedar Key is famed for its sweet, succulent clams, it was the area’s fat, salty oysters that once ruled the shellfish business.

But they have fallen on hard times, much like their neighbors to the north in Apalachicola Bay and the local waters were depleted by a drought of several years that made the area waters too salty for oysters to thrive and made them vulnerable to disease.

The third event of the Team SeaTow Elite Redfish Challenge 2014, organized by Capt'n Danny Allen, is in Cedar Key this weekend. The event is expected to bring in a large number of anglers and their boats from around the state.
Allen, the Cedar Key Beacon's fishing columnist, is holding the event for the second time. The final event in the series will be Aug. 23 in Steinhatchee. Events have already been held at Steinhatchee and Homosassa.